How we review a fishing rod
Four things decide every rod score on eTackle. Here’s exactly what we look at, from the butt cap to the tip ring.
- Build quality
- Casting & feel
- Playing fish
- Value for money
What we’re looking at
When reviewing fishing rods we focus on 4 main key attributes, and most of them come down to parts you can put your hands on.
- 1Handle & reel seat
Quality, materials and performance.
Build quality - 2The blank
How it was made, how it feels, its power, subtlety and balance.
Build quality · Playing fish - 3The eyes
Quality, materials and performance of the rings.
Build quality - 4Butt to tip: cast and feel
How smooth the cast is, and how the rod feels when you’re playing a fish.
Casting & feel
Blank · Handle · Reel seat · EyesBuild quality
When assessing the build quality of a fishing rod we focus on the raw materials used to build the rod and how they knit together to output the rod’s overall performance.
One of the key parts of this assessment is the blank. We look at how it was made, how it feels, its power, its subtlety, its overall balance as well as the materials used to build it.
We also focus on the quality, materials and performance of the handle, the reel seat, and the eyes on the rod.
Smooth cast · FeelCasting & feel
Casting & feel comes down to two things: how smooth the cast is, and how the rod feels when you’re playing a fish.
Without stating the obvious here, we test how the rod casts both short distances and longer distances. We are examining how smooth the cast is and how much effort is required to gain the desired distance.
We also test accuracy to see if the rod (in the right hands) can hit a designated spot a certain number of times. The more times the rod casts the required distances with the required accuracy, the higher it scores.
Power · Subtlety · EnjoymentPlaying fish
Let’s face it, we all go fishing to catch fish. We also want to enjoy the experience when doing so. Rods are reviewed in this category by simply catching fish and rating the experience of the fight.
We are looking at how a rod can dictate a fight, i.e. its power, how subtle it is and most importantly how enjoyable it is to play fish on.
An entry-level rod: fair marks for build, top marks for value. It’s a real eTackle score, and it lands at 7.6 overall.
Value for money
As an angler, you may have heard of the term ‘tackle tax’. If you haven’t, it’s when fishing tackle brands charge an extortionate amount of money when you can get the same quality product a lot cheaper elsewhere.
Under the ‘value for money’ review, we value and score the rod for its price-point against its quality and actual worth.
Every kind of rod, its own approach
The four scores never change. How we get to them depends on the fishing the rod is built for.
Carp rods
Reviewing carp rods is where it all started with eTackle and so is kind of our forte. For this reason we have a lot of first hand experience and often use this in our reviews.
Best carp rods
Pike & predator rods
Our pike and predator rod reviews have been carefully selected to cover all method types, with spinning rods, boat rods and deadbait rods being the most go-to types. The majority of predator rods have been tested and reviewed by ourselves.
Best pike rods
Sea rods
Our sea rod reviews mostly comprise well-researched opinions and expertise from the sea angling community, with some being tried and tested by the eTackle team. A combination of experience, anglers’ personal use of the rod, opinions and research all go into scoring a sea rod in a way that is fair and consistent.
Best sea fishing rodsHow the final score works
At eTackle, the scoring system is the same no matter the item of fishing tackle being reviewed. The only things that change are the actual attributes being tested, which depend on the type of tackle being assessed.
See the process in action
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